Watch bands are often sold separately from the watches to which they are to be attached. One reason for this is that styles in watch bands change more rapidly than styles in watches and watch cases and, during the life of the watch, wearers therefore frequently use several different watch bands. Another reason is that the preference of the user for watch bands of different types such as leather, plastic, metal, snake chain, buckle secured, or expansible may change from season to season or at the whim of the person concerned.
One problem presented to the manufacturer of watch bands is that the watch case lugs between which the end attachments of the watch bands are to be secured are not uniformly spaced in all watches. The watch band manufacturer therefore has been forced to make watch bands having a variety of widths of end attachments so as to fit various watch sizes and the jeweler from which the watch band is bought must perform delicate and time consuming operations on the end attachment to make it fit a particular watch. These tasks are expensive for the watch band manufacturer and for the retail dealer.
There have been many proposed solutions of the problem over a long period of time.
Examples of these proposed solutions are shown and described in Bert U.S. Pat. No. 3,897,612 dated Aug. 5, 1975 and in the application for reissue thereof Ser. No. 605,288 filed Aug. 18, 1975, which is to be granted May 4, 1976 as reissue U.S. Pat. No. 28793, and in the patents cited by the Examiner against the applications therefor and by the Applicant in the specifications thereof and the prior use cited by the Applicant in the Amendment Under Rule 312 filed in the application for reissue.
Other United States patents which have been called to my attention are:
______________________________________ U.S. Pat. No. Date Inventor ______________________________________ 3,939,534 February 24, 1976 Hayes 3,824,783 July 23, 1974 Nadeau 1,525,424 February 3, 1925 King 1,730,920 October 8, 1929 Dinstman 1,742,457 January 7, 1930 Wittman 2,718,750 September 27, 1955 Spalding 2,667,739 February 2, 1954 Flaig 2,608,050 August 26, 1952 Bender 1,550,024 August 18, 1925 Garst 3,750,238 August 7, 1973 Tanner ______________________________________
The closest prior art of which I am aware is Bert, U.S. Pat. No. 3,897,612 which in FIGS. 5 to 7 discloses a self-contained component for use in making end attachments for watch bands which includes a generally tubular member 21 formed from a strip of metal having a tab 24 adjacent to one of its ends and a tab 25 adjacent to its other end. It also includes two coiled compression springs 30 and a pair of hollow generally tubular inserts 32 each of which has a generally rectangular slot 32 having an open outer end and a substantially closed inner end. Each insert is formed from a strip of metal and the closed end of the slot is formed by the edges of a pair of tabs 34 which extend inwardly towards each other. The component can be assembled by an automatic machine which inserts the coiled springs into the generally tubular member 21 and then simultaneously inserts the hollow inserts at opposite ends of the tubular member compressing the springs until the inner ends of the rectangular slots pass beyond the tabs 24 and 25. Then the ends of the tabs 24 and 25 are bent into the longitudinal slots. Then the pressure on the outer ends of the inserts is released, the inner edges of the tabs 24 and 25 engage the outer edges of the tabs 34 and stop further outward movements of the inserts by the coiled springs.
While that prior art component is economical to manufacture and is easily assembled with the ends of metal, leather and plastic watch bands, it has been found that the inserts 32 skew relative to the generally tubular member thereby detracting from the aesthetic appearance of the ends of the watch band when the band is attached to a watch and the combination is worn by the user.